


Feather Fall

by impish_nature



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angel Wings, Blood, Hurt Aziraphale (Good Omens), Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Panic Attacks, Post-Apocalypse, Pre-Relationship, Protective Crowley (Good Omens), Self-Harm, Soft Crowley (Good Omens), WARNINGS:, aziraphale needs someone else to tell him everything will be ok, it gets dark but hopefully the comfort makes up for it later, talk and thoughts of falling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-16
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:28:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23687692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impish_nature/pseuds/impish_nature
Summary: What is an Angel without a connection to Heaven?
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 19
Kudos: 168





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> @sightkeeper asked a while back for Aziraphale whump with the line ‘Blood? Oh it’s not mine’ and I wrote 18k words from just that.  
> Warnings: Thoughts/talk of falling. Graphic violence (later). Panic attacks, blood, self harm. Some of these warnings are for another part but I’m putting them all here.
> 
> I'm just gonna say here that this is the only fic I've written that has ever made me feel lightheaded whilst writing it. I thought I was fine with it all, so I'm wondering if I held my breath while I was doing the dramatic bit *shrugs* I'll let you be the judge (it'll be in part 2 to this I think)
> 
> Also this was meant to be a one-shot but then it got to 18k words so I'm splitting it in three. Part 2 should be out tomorrow.

It had been three months since they had saved the world.

Three whole months. Ninety days. Two thousand, one hundred and sixty hours and counting.

And he was counting. Minutes, seconds, days, weeks, it all bled into one as he waited for _something_ to happen- because for some reason it didn't feel like they had saved the world at all.

There had been no joyous occasions, no fanfare or parade. No celebrations except their own minimal affair. Just the peaceful, quiet hum of life continuing on it's path, never knowing just how close they had come to seeing it all crumble around them.

Well that, and the score of snarling angels and demons on their tails.

He could almost understand the demons vicious rage, but the angels? His family? How could they so blindly follow old texts that no longer truly aligned with what the world and humanity had evolved into? How could they sit idly by and watch it all burn, content to fight in a war with no real meaning or end other than complete annihilation? Was the world that the Almighty had created, truly just collateral damage in the wider scheme of things? Did none of them see the contradictions? The hypocrisy? How did their faith override their reason so easily?

And beneath all the questions, all the unfulfilled answers, there was a deeper ache; yearning, cold and hollow. It stung deep in his chest, pulsing pitifully with every fluttering heartbeat- a dagger thrust there by those who should have understood him, should have stood _beside_ him.

Instead, they had tried to kill him with hellfire.

All for choosing humanity over an unjustifiable war. 

All for asking the questions no one else seemed to be asking.

...Had he been so wrong?

Aziraphale sat, lost in his own thoughts, his book forgotten on his lap. It threatened to slip off him onto the floor at a moment's notice that he wasn't even present enough to feel or hear happening. It had been three months. Three months and the only contact his brethren had had was to try and kill him. He'd hoped that it would all blow over, that they'd see the error in their ways and realise that he and Crowley had made the best decision for everyone.

It was wishful thinking, he knew that now.

Neither side would ever admit they were wrong, nor admit defeat. It wasn't in their nature.

A human hundreds of years ago had seen the truth, but it had taken watching his own body be dragged up to heaven for him to accept his fate.

Thankfully, he hadn't been himself then, nor had Crowley been soaked in holy water as the other side had decided. But there had been a hint of barely quelled fury in Crowley's eyes when he returned that let him know that it was not just the actions or hellfire that had spoken out loudly at that meeting. He knew Crowley would never tell him, he'd sugarcoat it or brush it off, but then again he didn't really need to know what had been said. The dagger in his heart still twisted at the implications regardless, that deep rooted sadness that refused to leave. 

Aziraphale tried to shake himself in his seat, the thoughts a dark cloud that needed to be swatted away. He brushed at his chest subconsciously, as if there was a physical item embedded there that he could tug out and be done with. It didn't matter what had been said. They wanted him dead, plain and simple. And when that hadn't worked, they'd cut him off. 

He hadn't realised until then what true freedom tasted like.

For a moment, the tension in his shoulders eased, his mind slipping to warmer thoughts. It had been blissful at first. He'd felt lighter, brighter, like a weight had lifted from him, chains that he hadn't even realised he was wearing crashing to the floor. He no longer had to hide himself, to dim his light to quell questions and curiosity at his actions. He no longer had to subject himself to their whims even when he disagreed, to bite his tongue and smile dutifully at every snide remark or reprimand. And best of all; he could go about his life in peace, spend his days with Crowley without fear of what management might say or think, because none of them had any right to say anything anymore. They may judge him, but without the fear of consequences looming above his head, what really was there to stop him from giving into temptations and living life, however he saw fit? 

He was already dead to them, or he would be if they had gotten there way, so, what more could he really do to anger them more than they already were? 

But then the doubts had spread.

It had started as a small voice, that hint of sadness, that he couldn't quite escape. And then like a creeping vine it had taken hold. It grew and grew, tendrils reaching into every crevice of his skull, strangling the happiness that he had thought he finally deserved.

Aziraphale swallowed, his eyes open and unseeing as his shoulders raised defensively around his neck. He hunched forward, arms gripping tight to his knees, a bid to protect himself as the cold seeped back through his lungs and the dagger pushed deeper still.

His family had deserted him.

As much as he disagreed with them, as much as he was glad to no longer be under their scrutiny, it still didn't feel quite right to be completely isolated from Heaven. To have their full and unabated disappointment echoing through the silence of a disconnected phone line.

Was this what it felt like to fall? The ache of loss that he couldn't control or reason away. Grieving over something he hadn't even truly wanted, but now that it was ripped entirely from his grasp, never to be his again...

The thought sent a shudder down his spine and he propelled himself from his seat without thought, giving into the need to move, to pace. The book crashed to the ground at his feet, to be stumbled upon and kicked away with little remorse. Shame and repulsion slid heavily into his gut; a meal he wished he hadn't eaten and put him off eating ever again, whilst guilt and fear fizzled through his extremities, tingling down his fingers to keep them restlessly twining together as he paced. 

It was nauseating and disturbingly unfamiliar, as if a beast had taken up residence inside his core and refused to be abated until he begged for forgiveness for crimes he hadn't even committed. 

It roared to life inside of him, it fed on the panic and the paranoia, the doubts and the disorientation. It didn't care who was right or who was wrong, only that he reach a resolution and fast. It whispered insidiously in his ear, voice shifting between Gabriel's and _Her_ 's until his heart was clattering against his ribs and beating in his throat, and no amount of reminding himself that he didn't _need_ a heartbeat would halt it.

_You need to fix this. You are the fault, the issue. Heaven's closed its gates to you, how long until that is irreversible? What do your opinions matter against that?_

_Your fall is imminent- that is, if it hasn't started already..._

"Don't be ridiculous." The words ground out of him amidst gritted teeth and an uncooperative tongue. The voices hushed against the sound, the beast curious and patient at his interruption. The blood pumping through his ears receded as his own commanding voice took centre stage and pushed the fear back in its place, down to the depths where it belonged. Or perhaps it wasn't his own voice, perhaps it was the accompanying shocked hiss, a spark of gold in the darkness, that lit up his brain and soothed his racing heart.

_We picked our side. We picked the human's side. We did the right thing. Heaven **and** Hell are against us, surely that's got to mean something?_

"I'm not falling." Aziraphale stood up straight, closing his eyes for a second to take a deep breath before glaring out at the open air, as if his aggressors were there in the room with him. "I would know. Crowley refuses to talk about his fall, and I will be damned if we place this- this- _tiff_ at the same level as his suffering."

It was abhorrent, disrespectful, that his mind would put the two anywhere near one another.

The beast was subdued for a moment, irritated but conceding. It shrunk in size and let him breathe easier as clarity and logic took over his thought patterns.

...The peace didn't last long.

Her voice, quiet and questioning, echoed past all the others. It created space where it needed, growing in form and consistency, engulfing him in its reverberations. 

_How would you know?_

"I'm sorry?" The words stuttered out of him before he could stop them. A puff of irritation fizzled through his chest, his hands clenching into fists.

What was he doing apologising to an imaginary voice? It wasn't _real_. It was just his mind playing tricks on him.

She wasn't here. She wasn't talking to him.

And if She was, he hoped that he would have enough in him not to shrink at Her presence, that he could ask all the questions that, over the years of silence, had begun to sit and multiply at the back of his throat every time he thought of Her.

His resolve didn't stop the flow of the voice though. The one that slid across the surface of his brain and mingled with his own thoughts until he wasn't sure if it was Her or him that spoke them into reality.

It was pervasive, humoured by his ignorance and strengthened by his doubts.

_How would **you** know what falling feels like? _

Aziraphale swallowed past the lump in his throat. A strangely hysterical part of his mind was proud of himself for having the foresight to close the shop early that day. Humans weren't all that fond of people having fights with themselves nor imaginary people. "I don't... I've seen it, heard about it. The Fall. They fell from- it wasn't a slow process. It's never _been_ a slow process. There was never any doubt that they had fallen." 

_Well, that was then. No one's fallen in millennia. There was also never any doubt that they had lost sight, that they had lost faith. They fell for their reasons, you're falling for yours._

A sharper voice grated through, Her voice opening up the floodgates for it to return from the depths he'd cast it to. It was darker, less hypothetical, and more disparaging as it snarled at him. 

_You never could do anything right. Why would this be any different?_

He was suddenly finding it hard to breathe, the need for oxygen to unnecessary lungs somehow desperate and required. The room was closing in on him, shrinking into a suffocating prison built purposefully for him. Each book, each shadow, opened another set of eyes that dispassionately watched his descent, judging him for every little action, every thought, every word, every minuscule _movement_ -

Her voice slipped through the soft breeze, sending goosebumps trailing across his flesh and the hairs raising on the back of his neck.

_Perhaps every day you make the choice to fall just that little bit further..._

A soft clatter dragged some of his awareness back into the room. His eyes focused in and out on a small button rolling across the floor away from him with no recognition or recollection of where it had come from.

It wasn't until there was the remains of a bow tie held too tightly in his hand that he realised he'd been tugging at his collar in an effort to get his breathing under control. 

_And one day you'll realise with a shock that you haven't been an angel for a very long time._

_"_ Stop it." 

The cacophony of voices abruptly left him, like he had snapped the lid shut on whatever horrific chest they had manifested from. 

Aziraphale stood in the deserted silence, breathing hitching and twisting as the shift took him by surprise and left him hollow, his own voice the only one now flying around his head in a wisp of fear and paranoia born from no one but himself. 

He wasn't sure if he had accidentally miracled the others away or if this was some new harsh punishment set out by his old management.

At least, when the voices hadn't been his own he could pretend that this wasn't all his own doing.

_Your choice, **your** choice- your fault. Can't blame anyone else for this. You stepped over the edge, you made the choice, no one else._

"This is... absurd." He swallowed, his patience and practicality paper thin and fragile against the onslaught, but still there, a thread of sanity in a tumultuous sea. "Utterly ridiculous." Every word added a layer, a knot, another steadying, gratifying breath to his heaving lungs. "You're _fine,_ for Go- goodness- for goodness sake."

_The road to Hell is paved with good intentions._

"We did the right thing." 

Silence rang back at him across the empty room, disapproval and condemnation cloying the air like a stagnant smell that refused to budge. It didn't matter if they could hear him, not really, not when the answer would always be the same.

So many eyes upon him but so desperately alone.

"We did." If only he could believe it himself without a shadow of a doubt- without thinking about how many of his compatriots disagreed, how much pain they were happy to put him through because of his decision- perhaps then the dam would break and the fear of holy retribution would finally leave him. "It was the right thing to do."

The silence remained. His new unwanted companion. How many times had he wished for freedom from their scrutiny? Yet now as the feeling of being watched dissipated into the ether, he couldn't help but feel that every utterance from his mouth turned another spectator away from him, taking a piece of his grace with them.

Turning their backs, one by one. He didn't _want_ their forgiveness- but he needed it all the same.

"It has to be."

Whether or not he wanted it, he was alone. No longer watched, no longer listened to. 

He could do as he pleased.

As long as he was happy to fall for it.

Aziraphale moved. He wasn't sure where or what he was doing at first, just that there was a sharp need at his core to do _something_. His common sense and logical approach just weren't cutting it today. No amount of philosophical reading or prayer could fix the anxious storm that brewed inside his skull. He'd been able to tamper it down before, even forget its existence when in the company of a rather distracting friend, but it had always returned when he was alone, always bubbled back up, thick and oozing through every pore as if to suffocate him.

So now it was time for another approach. 

Before he knew it, he found himself in front of a mirror, one that he wasn't even sure had been there before this very moment, though he didn't have the mental resources to really think that through at present. It was also rather reminiscent to one he had seen in someone else's apartment, but again- now was not the time to think of such things. Instead he found himself staring at his reflection, inspecting it, almost as if he would be able to see the difference his actions had caused. As if he would see some kind of blemish that would prove his fears correct, or crush them to non-existence with little fanfare, if only he could prove to himself that all was as it should be.

A rather optimistic and unrealistic notion perhaps, but one that he couldn't help but hold onto.

In reality, he wasn't really sure what he was looking for. 

He was unkempt that was for sure.

Aziraphale stared into his own almost unseeing eyes, filled with a strange sheen of dread that he wasn't used to seeing. His chest was rising and falling in sharp bursts, his breathing still quickening under the stress he'd managed to put himself under. He tried to brush past the fear, ignore it for the time being, and instead stare deep and wide eyed into his own gaze for a hint of- _something_. Something new, something wrong, something- well, _different_. 

The watery gleam to his expression may not be familiar, nor the pasty pallor of his skin, but it was still undeniably him.

He gave a soft, long, exhale, some modicum of certainty seeping into his system.

As much as he had a soft spot for a certain serpent's eyes... they were hardly subtle.

If he really were changing, he would expect a rather more dramatic change in his appearance, something that would say 'beware of me!' to humans. 

If anything his reflection looked rather more human than it had any right to. With it's soft tremors and heavy breathing, hair wild and matted from fingers he didn't recall running through locks. With his shoulders hunched defensively around his ears as if to weather any storms thrown at him from the outside world.

Not to mention his _suit_.

A soft noise of distaste clicked across his tongue as his crumpled suit finally made it's way into his vision, taking his attention gladly from rather more important matters. He tried to straighten himself out; dusting off his shoulders, brushing down his sleeves and tugging at the hem. It was a frustrating task, one that usually took only moments, but for some reason was proving rather futile as he twisted and tugged to get his appearance back in order.

It was only when he gave up with a soft huff and went to the final task of straightening his collar, that he finally noted the distinct lack of a familiar bow tie, fingers flitting over non-existent material without thought.

He shook himself, ignoring the drop in his stomach at not noticing a rather vital part of his outward appearance. Pushed down the clamouring voices to _check- check again, check everything, you missed something, you're wrong_. He didn't need his bow tie, he wasn't going anywhere. Aziraphale continued his ministrations around his collar as nonchalantly as possible, as if he hadn't noticed anything amiss at all. All he had to do was fasten his top button and he'd be able to look at his reflection again and all would be well- 

Oh.

His top button was missing.

His fingertips ran over the yielding fabric, thumbing the hole on one side and pulling perplexedly at the few stray threads on the other where a button had once been.

When had that- oh. Oh, he remembered now. 

Aziraphale swallowed, closing his eyes. He felt his adam's apple bob against his knuckles as he tried to think straight. He'd read about this, hadn't he? Humans had all kinds of words for these situations. Where panic made the mind go blank to the outside world. When just being inside a struggling body was hard enough to cope with, let alone spending energy and effort on anything else. 

The only thing was- he'd never heard of an angel suffering similarly.

Then again, he'd never heard of a demon being afflicted either.

Having said that, though... He wasn't sure he'd heard of any angels or demons going against the grain quite like they had, at least not since the Fall.

He found himself laughing without intention, a mildly hysterical chuckle that rattled through him until he wasn't sure if they were morphing into sobs.

Who was he fooling? No one had ever done what he and Crowley had done before. No one had attempted the things they had achieved. Why on Earth did he think that anything that happened next would have any semblance to what had come before?

All the research, and all the time in the world, would never be able to prepare them for whatever came next.

Because no one had any inclining as to _what_ would come next.

They were all completely in the dark and there was no light coming.

They had to make their own way from now on, their own choices- and whether they liked it or not, the other angels and demons were in the same boat as him and Crowley.

Just like the humans.

Aziraphale blinked, his eyes finding his own reflection once more, not even comprehending the moisture clinging to his eyelashes and leaving glistening marks down his cheeks.

_Just like humanity._

His laughter bubbled up again, this time hollow but accepting. Humanity had dealt with this for as long as they could remember. Faith and belief only got you so far, the rest was a choice you made every day. To be good, to do good- there was nothing stopping them, not really, only their own thoughts and feelings and those around them.

Every day they dealt with the knowledge that they truthfully- knew nothing at all.

And that was OK.

It had to be OK for them.

And now, it had to be OK for everyone else as well.

None of them had ever known Her plan. Not really.

They'd hoped they understood, they'd hoped She wasn't setting them up for failure.

Because why would She?

Her and Her plan- they were ineffable. That's all there was to it.

But then on the other hand- they were _ineffable_.

How on Earth could they ever live up to a plan that they had no way of comprehending? How could they follow those distinct orders without knowing why, or how, or even whether they were following them correctly?

Maybe She hadn't set them up to fail, but at the same time, She had doomed them to failure.

They would forever fall short of Her expectations. Because none of them knew what Her expectations were.

Perhaps, they weren't all that different from humanity, after all.

"Different..."

The word left him in an almost reverent hush.

There was _one_ rather glaring difference. 

Between humans, angels and demons.

He just wasn't sure he was ready to visualise the outcome of his transgressions.

"Stop being ridiculous." He growled, his teeth clamping together as his watery gaze hardened to ice. Self-loathing was bubbling up thick and fast, eclipsing all other thoughts and feelings as it heaved and seethed throughout his frame, it twisted his earlier tremors into something almost unrecognisable, more forceful, sharper in his twitching muscles. 

No other angel or demon would have this much trouble looking at themselves in a mirror.

Not unless they had something to hide.

And he didn't. _He didn't_ -

A soft low swish muffled and dampened the electric air around him. Warmth encircled his frame, his wings unfurling from the ether to rest either side of him, downy and light against the fabric of his suit. Feathers brushed against his neck as, just for a moment, he let himself be cocooned in their embrace, soothed by his own heavenly essence when no one else would embrace him or remind him that he wasn't alone.

Aziraphale let himself stand in that tranquil darkness for a few moments. Let himself breathe in the subtle smell that lingered from the ether they were kept in. He hardly ever got them out and the brush of nostalgia that the sensations brought forth was sustaining him in that instance, reminding him of all the good that he had done, all the times from long before when it had been the norm to wander with them proudly visible. That is, before the humans came along and didn't understand, needed answers to questions they couldn't give and they had begun to hide amongst them instead.

But this wouldn't do.

This wasn't what he had come here to do.

He took a deep inhale, holding his breath for a few more seconds before he unfurled his wings on the exhale. He gave them a cursory glance in the mirror, scrunching up his face in mild contempt at the sorry state they were in, dusty from their containment.

"I'm glad it's only me here right now. The higher ups would have a fit." The words came out in a soft grumble, a half relieved sigh at the notion that he was alone slipping past the pit of loneliness that had been consuming him. 

He really was such a contrary being. One moment he hated it, the next he rejoiced it.

He ignored the hissing notions that still wormed their way into his head, instead turning away from the mirror to find a suitable place to groom himself. His fingers had already started before he had found a place to sit, twisting and tugging at itching feathers that were making themselves known the longer he had them out in the open. "When was the last time I did this? Too long ago. That's for sure."

He continued to tut and tsk at himself as he plopped himself down, focusing on one wing and then the other. It was an arduous task, one filled with somehow knotted together feathers and tweaking unruly down until it lay flat and in position like it should. There were a few that came away altogether but he ignored them as they fell, knowing in the way they dropped off into his hands and fluttered to the ground, that they should have been gone a long time ago if he'd thought to check on them. There were a few difficult spots, frustrating, irritating tangles that he couldn't help but curse and bemoan at, all the while ignoring his heart, threatening to beat out of his chest, every time a stubborn piece of dirt took longer than it should to leave his white shimmering wings.

It wasn't until he finished, back in front of the mirror, fiddling with the hardest to reach feathers on his back that he realised they were all the spotless white they had always been.

There were no darkening stains, no grey spaces or sparse black feathers leaking through like ink on gleaming snow. 

Fear and paranoia shed from his back like another layer of itching feathers, his shoulders falling as the weight on them lifted. 

"See?" The word left him in a puff of air, misting up his reflection in one relaxing exhale. 

He continued to fiddle with some feathers, pushing and pulling them to make sure they stayed in position, ever the perfectionist now that he had a task before him. "I really should do this more often."

He dropped his hands, letting his wings relax before miracling his collar back to how it should be, running a quick hand through his hair to tame his wayward locks. 

"Absolutely nothing to worry about."


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, please read the warnings in the tags.  
> There will be comfort in the last chapter I promise. This was meant to be one big one shot.

He didn't know if it was because he'd finally paid attention to them, but his wings seemed to itch far more often now that his mind had focused on their existence.

It became a habit, every time his mind strayed to worrisome thoughts, his fingers stretched out to caress unseen wings, pulling them out with only a short flick of a miracle to lock the book shop's door. It was almost a compulsion, a necessity to stem the rising tides and no amount of fear of discovery seemed to be able to pull him quite out of the sudden rush of _need_. 

At first, it had only been once a day, then twice, and then the need had grown bigger, more all consuming.

Now his wings prickled against his skin, right where they met his spine, the reminder of them ever present at the back of his mind. Every subtle shift of fabric sent irritation through invisible bones and ruffled feathers he'd rather were left untouched.

It made his teeth grit and his jaw ache with the near constant pressure.

It took every ounce of self restraint to get through the day before releasing them from their confines.

He'd never felt so constricted before, so dejected and discontent within his own skin. 

Even Gabriel's barbed words hadn't hit him quite as hard as he felt in this moment. He didn't need anyone else to make him feel dissatisfied with himself anymore, to feel broken and confused and _not enough_.

But as long as he kept preening, as long as he kept reminding himself that beneath it all, deep down under it all, he was _still_ an angel, then he could get through this.

He hadn't changed.

And one day, everyone else would see that too. 

He wasn't in the wrong. He couldn't be.

So, why weren't his ministrations working any more?

The shop light was dimming as the evening drew in, but he hadn't yet had the heart to turn on the lights and truly judge himself again. Even as he stood, staring balefully into a slowly darkening mirror, wondering where exactly everything had gone wrong.

Or perhaps what truly stopped him lighting up the room, was the fact that normally, even in this low a light, his wings would normally catch enough of it for him to relax. 

It was strange how easy it was to miss something that you'd never even truly noticed before until it was gone from your sight. His wings had been like the moon before, reflecting any small traces of light to keep him from succumbing to the darkness. They had no source of light of their own, of course, but all the same they had given warmth and refuge from the shadows wherever and whenever possible.

Only now...

Now there was nothing.

They felt lifeless, heavy against his shoulders. The sheen that had once permeated them had all but gone, lost somewhere along the line but he wasn't sure when or how exactly. He was sure it had been a slow process, sure that every time he had preened them before the mirror in the last few weeks he had squinted at them, noting something was _off_ but he hadn't been able to put his finger on what exactly he was doing wrong. He was going through the motions he had always been taught to, dutifully doing exactly what he was told to make himself presentable- holy even. Appearances may not have been everything but they certainly had to keep up some kind of reverence from the masses when required. 

He'd never really known why before. He'd always thought it would be better to be a soft presence that was barely felt but known all the same. The kind of helpful nature and soft miracles that guides towards faith instead of extravagant shows of power dictating it. 

But now... now he felt like he understood at least a little bit more.

What human would look at him now and see an angel? A bedraggled pale shadow of a man, hiding away in the back of a bookstore, with no connection to Heaven aside from what he saw in the mirror.

A poor excuse of an angel.

He ran his fingers through the edges of his feathers, hissing in dismay at the feel of them. They were ragged, and almost sharp, like a coarse layer of dirt clung to them and glued them together. He didn't _understand._ His eyes prickled with warm frustration. He was grooming them meticulously, cleaning and tweaking them but no matter what he did, he still felt dirty, felt suffocated, like nothing he was doing would ever be enough.

Was this it? Was this how it would start for him? Feeling unclean and rotten until his entire demeanour followed suit?

Why else would his wings never come clean? The filth clung to him to remind him of his past deeds. Every blemish smeared and added to the sticky tar for more dust to settle onto.

Why else would they refuse to shimmer? Their holy essence dimming further every time he struggled to find it again with shaking hands and scouring fingers. He scrubbed and rubbed until the dirt came off, until the grease of years of sins slid clear and his feathers felt soft and light like a comforting warm blanket around him. 

But the next time he looked they would always be worse than before. Ruffled and twisted as if the slightest action disjointed the mirage he was trying to keep hold of and settled them back into their now natural form.

Dishevelled, mangy, mangled- just like him. An inconvenience, a burden.

_Not even bad enough to fall._

The thought was a jarring pain in the side of his head, like it physically landed there and ricocheted around his skull. Because it was true wasn't it? At least if he fell he'd know. He'd know he'd done wrong, he'd know that all of his efforts had been for naught. But this waiting, this painstaking, agonising drip of losing himself was almost too much to bear. Every second through the hourglass was another second of punishment from the Almighty and he knew it to be so.

Because surely- surely if that wasn't the case- if She actually was proud of his actions, if he had done the right thing- She wouldn't let him- She _couldn't_ let him-

But She did.

She let him languish in this pain.

Was She testing him? Waiting for him to account for his sins and repent?

But what should he repent _for_ exactly? She'd know if he was lying. And even in his misery he couldn't bring himself to regret his decisions.

The humans lived on, never knowing what had almost befallen them and he couldn't bring himself to wish that he had never played his part.

So why did She still wait? Why didn't she cut his strings already? Her unwieldy puppet that refused to do what it was told without tying itself in knots first. 

What even was he at this point? He wasn't an angel, that was for sure. But he wasn't a demon either, not yet at least. And regardless of his love for them, he could never truly reside among the humans, not completely and without exception. There was too much knowledge in his head, too much time on his hands for his life not to bleed with pain as their fleeting lives left him one by one.

So if he wasn't any of them- what was he?

_Nothing._

His reflection flinched at the word, wings fluttering ever so, even though he couldn't feel it himself, not when the word struck such a chord.

_Nothing._

It sounded about right. He _felt_ like nothing. Hollow and cold and tired. He could fade out of existence and no one would even notice. 

No, that wasn't quite right. They would rejoice. 

_It would have been better if I had just walked into the Hellfire._

Aziraphale jolted again, a tremor of glass digging into his chest and rippling through his entire body. The second vicious thought brushed past the first in a burning line of fire, suffocating it. It prickled down his cheeks, warm and wet and seeping into his collar. 

He couldn't pull the thought back into the depths though, he couldn't shove it away because deep down he could feel it in his core. Deep down he knew that it was true.

Rather a quick death than this painful, slow, agonising stumble into the unknown. 

_But..._

But that would have meant Crowley dying too, burned away by a substance meant to protect.

And he could never regret saving Crowley from Holy water. Never.

Thinking about Crowley brought a small swell of hope, a dampening, lingering thing that threatened to keep him from giving in to his fate for just a little longer. 

After all- he would care, wouldn't he? He would notice if he disappeared? He wouldn't rejoice at his sudden departure from his life, not like everyone else. Not like those he had thought were family, no matter how much they disagreed or argued or got on each other's nerves- Crowley would still _care_. 

Perhaps, he wasn't nothing. At least to one person, he wasn't less than nothing. 

Besides, if he made it clear that Hellfire could hurt him... then he was also opening Crowley back up to his abhorrent fate.

No, he couldn't do that to him.

He could bear this torment to keep him alive, to keep him whole.

He wouldn't leave him, not now that they had both chosen this path away from their respective sides. That would be terribly unfair. To leave him to this fate all alone. Crowley had already fallen once before from grace, now he'd fallen even further, shunned even by the demons he had had to make roost with. It wasn't fair to put his current troubles against his, wasn't fair to leave him in that languish when he'd already been through this before. 

Just because _he_ couldn't deal with falling, didn't mean Crowley should have to be alone. 

After all, it surely couldn't be for much longer, right? Surely, soon She would see reason and cast him aside already. 

This was a punishment. That was all. He should have known there would be consequences. 

He would endure it all. He had to. 

For Crowley.

Perhaps that reaction was cause for punishment as it was.

An angel accepting a painful fate to stop a demon receiving the same. 

...Maybe he'd never been a very good angel to begin with.

A soft whimper left him, the sound eclipsing everything else as he came back into the room, eyes filling with disgust at the vision before him. His hair was a mess, as ill kept and listless as his wings. There were tear tracks staining his cheeks, his lip still trembling under the force of them as his eyes shined brightly with a heat that burned more and more tears from him. 

"Stop it." 

His reflection ignored him, voice shaky at best as it exited his lips.

"I said, stop it." 

He willed the light beside him to come on, the harsh beam doing nothing to hide his flaws, showing off every infinitesimal vile detail back to him in stark contrast. But it was what he wanted, what he needed. He needed to take a good long look at himself and sort himself out. 

"You're an angel- at least for now. Act like one. This is beneath you." He found his voice channelling someone else, others that he wished not to think about lest their voices return to continue their tirades at him. He stared and stared, eyes growing brighter and brighter as he began a meticulous task that he had never performed before. 

Instead of grooming, he miracled.

He glanced upon every feather and healed and soothed, bringing back their heavenly glow in the only way he knew how. Every small speck of grey back to gleaming snow, every twisted quill miraculously straight, soft and warm as if he'd basked in the sunlight for hours instead of standing for hours in a darkening hall. It took almost no time at all, before he was stood, staring once more at himself, as if nothing had ever happened and all his efforts over the last weeks hadn't been for nothing. As if he hadn't fallen to pieces, hadn't crashed to the floor in a mess of feathers and salt water that would stain the floor for years to come.

"See? Good as new." 

The words sounded fake even before they left his lips. 

As fake as the wings glittering at his back.

As fake as the smile plastered across his face.

As fake as the heart beating in his chest.

* * *

His cycle began anew after that night, changed but ever present.

Locking up shop and hiding from the world became an earnest craving throughout the day, his words barbed and biting at any who dared enter before he finally gave in and snapped the sign to closed. Every morning became a slow arduous task just to keep things running how they should, even as he tried his best to ignore the mirror and his urges and pretend just for a moment that he was _fine_.

But all he really wanted to do was watch his descent- though perhaps it was more of a need than a want. To keep track of just how far he had fallen. Every second felt like another tug down towards somewhere he refused to go and the need to check, to observe, to try and halt the process, became a consistent compulsion that could very rarely be dissuaded. 

It started with an itch that would grow stronger the more he tried to ignore it. His eyes would stray to his now familiar mirror, as he chewed at his lip, the need to just _check_ thrumming through his head. Then his fingers would begin to tap, restlessly moving as the impulse to tweak, to straighten out unruly feathers he knew were hiding in the ether, would take over and before he knew it he was staring at his reflection once more, hands already dancing across his wings subconsciously.

Then the light would begin to fade and his actions would get more rigorous, filled with righteous fear and shame that his efforts weren't working. He'd find feathers wherever he rested for a moment. Soft, greying, frayed little wisps of fluff that couldn't stay tight where they should. The more he stared at them, the more he contemplated how repulsive they were; half formed and malnourished. They were strange, twisted, little things, as if someone had forgotten what a feather should look like but had stuck them on him all the same.

Yet for some reason he couldn't bring himself to miracle them away. Destroying them felt like a kindness that he shouldn't afford himself. So instead he whisked them away out of sight of anyone else, a burden only to himself. A growing pile of all his sins burying the upstairs rooms in a layer of his shame.

Another punishment, another test. 

But then his fear would ignite into anger- at himself, at the world, at heaven, at anyone and anything that dared frequent his head at the wrong time. He would miracle away the shoddy, sagging excuse for wings his body had dredged up from existence, and bring them back to their former pristine glory. Sometimes he'd even go a step further, thinking of others wings he'd seen so long ago, letting those recollections bend the reality of his own. They were always better wings, brighter wings, not his own useless, disappointing ones. But those times only made everything worse. 

After all, wasn't that a sin in itself? To want more than he had been given? To covet things that were not his own and besmirch something She had made?

And so he'd go back to his own. His gleaming, snow white wings that no longer held any relief when he saw them.

After all, it was all a ruse.

Just a mask, as fake as the lies he kept trying to tell himself that everything would be over soon.

What did it matter what he looked like when deep down he knew he was already rotten to the core?

But still he tried. 

Appearances mattered, after all. 

And so the cycle would continue, the newly moulded wings, heavy and stiff upon his back, still aching from the torment he was putting them through day after day, night after night.

He could deal with the pain. He deserved that.

It was when the itching reemerged that his mind flared up with oozing, twisting thoughts. Their words and snarls bit worse than the physical pain ever could.

They sent him racing back to the mirror, clawing at his back, to fix the newest mistakes he had made.

* * *

"You're never going to let me rest, are you?"

The words were said to his reflection, but they were meant for someone else. The one who he'd been taught was always listening.

"This is it, forever, isn't it?" His eyes had lost their shine, his skin pallid, his voice insipid. He was tired of fighting a losing battle. Tired of pretending, of hoping for better. He couldn't go upstairs anymore. Not without the burden of his sins instantly pressing down on him, a sea of feathers dusting the floor as if he'd decided to create a carpet of them. 

He wished they'd rot away to nothing already.

Rot just like he was, until there was nothing left of any of him any more.

"I should have realised that falling wasn't the only fate you had for us. You've tormented humans rather inventively for thousands of years. Why wouldn't you have had new ideas for how to treat us in the meantime?" He didn't care how ungrateful he sounded, how ignorant or careless his words may be. He'd already done enough damage. "Am I your newest Cain? Is that it? Cursed to forever wander this Earth of yours, but to never find a place to fit? To forever be different and never truly find home now that I have forsaken the one you gave me?"

Silence was his only answer. 

"Or did the humans give you new ideas?" His mind felt like it was stuck with tar, clogging up his mental workings as his fingers, fidgeted and fiddled with a particularly stubborn feather. "Am I Sisyphus and these wings are my boulder? A task I will never complete but cannot bring myself to turn away from?" He glared at the feather, yanking it again. "How long before you decide this is not enough and invoke Tantalus too? So that all the things I love on Earth turn to dust and ash and nothing brings me joy anymore?"

A strange laugh echoed through the corridor, so cold and dismal, that it took a moment to realise it was emanating from himself.

"See? I'm even giving you ideas now. It doesn't take long, does it? I wonder if I could come up with worse punishments for myself than you-" His teeth grit hard enough to hurt, his teeth groaning under the pressure. "Blast this infernal feather, will you just do as you're told-" He wrenched it down, trying to make it lie straight like its brethren, just as it was supposed to- just as he was supposed to- " _Fuck_." A sharp pain coursed through him, his wings curling inwards reflexively as the feather tore from the skin, plucked out in its entirety.

He stared at the feather crushed tight in his fist. His heavy breathing and the pumping of blood through the veins in his ears, the only sound in the vicinity. 

His fingernails began to bite into his skin as he crushed the feather tighter, watched all his hard work and efforts into grooming the feather crumple beneath his own willing hand. It had hurt, his wing still smarting slightly at its removal but his mind turned even slower than before. It wasn't a struggle to think, though, not like before, it was just a slow, simmering heat, like the storm had finally broken or that there was a brief respite from Her all-consuming disappointment in him.

This felt... right.

There was a shock of adrenaline coursing through him, a sudden, stomach swooping feeling of relief. Like he'd plucked a rotten fruit from the vine and now the rest of the plant could live just that little bit longer.

Was this Her? Was she giving him an answer?

Telling him to endure the pain, keep pulling out the decaying parts of his soul until he was on the right path again.

Would that be enough for redemption? To physically pluck the sins out by the roots and let Her know that he knew he deserved this. That he would do anything to be in Her good graces once more.

He dropped the feather like it was poison, letting it flutter off to join the other decaying resentments upstairs. There was a new vigour to his actions, a new clarity as his fingers dug into the still aching space where the feather had been, gouging and scratching at the area as if he could pull out any remaining poison from it. 

His ministrations carried on until the skin was raw, his fingernails too blunt to pierce the skin but enough to leave thick red lines that stung to even shift against, a gasp of pain flinching out of him as he braved touching the area once more.

He finally let the wings fall, let his gleaming, half maddened eyes find themselves in the mirror, his chest heaving as he panted.

It hurt, hurt more than it had since all of this had begun. He couldn't occupy himself this time, could feel the pain like a pulse, beating in time with his heartbeat and searing through his flesh every time he moved.

But it was a good pain.

He found shelter in it, rejoiced in it. 

She would forgive him, surely She would forgive him.

~~~

He tried to miracle his wings a lot less after his revelation.

That had been pride talking, he was sure of it now. Vindictive pride trying to stop him from taking the path that he was meant to be taking. 

His appearance wasn't what mattered, it was his remorse, his apology to the Almighty that truly mattered.

She would see him through. Of course She would. 

He gave each feather a chance, pushed it back in line and groomed it, waiting patiently for it to make its mistakes and ignore his new resolution before he did what was necessary. Each one deserved a chance, he'd give them that, just like he hoped She was giving him a chance. And then when it was clear that they would never fit with the others, forever disobeying him and ignoring the righteous cause, he would tug them from their home, pull them out of their safe space and show them that their behaviour would not be accepted. 

It was what they wanted him to do right? To prove he understood why all of this was happening.

He'd stepped out of line. He'd chosen to do that. He had to prove he could go back into the fold if he were to be accepted there again.

He tried not to think about it too much. Every time he did he knew that once his penance had been fulfilled they would question him. They would ask him about his actions and what he would do in the future.

And he would lie. He would say he understood, he would say he'd never step out of line again, and the lies would drip like black tar from his lips, suffocating him in their falsehoods and adding more and more sins to his belt.

Because none of it was true. If given the choice to go back, he'd do it again and again.

No matter what, he couldn't regret saving them.

He couldn't regret choosing Crowley.

And every time he thought of it all, another feather would begin to burn, would feel hot and wrong when he groomed and he would focus his attention on it instead of thoughts of the future. He would watch it, wait for it to decide its fate and then give it its due punishment.

It was not his fault they refused to obey, it was not his fault that they were to be punished for it.

And every feather pulled gave him another surge of endorphins. Another latch on his heart opening back up to let him breathe again.

He was doing the right thing, they'd all understand, soon enough they'd understand.

His resolve would crash upon a knock on the door though. 

The sudden appearance of a dear old friend who knew nothing of the turmoil in his heart. 

He couldn't tell him either. Couldn't tell Crowley that unlike him, She had given him a chance to stay. Had given him a task to atone himself. He didn't know how he would react, felt a new bout of shame at the thought that Crowley had never had the chance and how unfair that was, but also a dismal lurch of fear that he would try and stop him. That he would recoil at the prospect and ask him if falling was really that awful a thought to him. If being like him was that awful a thought.

And at this point, it wasn't. He just wished She'd let him fall already if She was content with him to do so.

It was this blasted waiting that broke him so. The constant trails of _what if, what if, what if_ -

He couldn't bear the silence. He couldn't bear the emptiness. 

Everything was hollow in this strange new world without a connection to Heaven.

But he couldn't let Crowley see that.

He couldn't let him know how much of a failure he truly was.

Before he'd even truly thought about it, his wings would be back to their former glory, hidden back in the ether where no one would be able to see them for what they truly were. He'd keep the act up, keep the mask on all the time the other was with him. Sometimes he'd even forget, for a moment, that the burning on his back was not from the sun but from his own infected wings. 

Crowley always had been good at distracting him from important issues.

His temptations were so freely given and so easily taken.

But then he'd return to the quiet. To the dark, unending solitude and he'd remember all the rotten feathers he'd haphazardly glued back into his skin.

He'd spend those nights ripping them all back out, grim satisfaction fuelling his movements as he tore each and every last one of them from raised, red, heated skin. The skin never healed quite right with the miracles, it itched and burned where he rubbed and scratched it raw, so each feather hung limp and buckled, held in only by the force of his earlier misguided miracle.

It was only when the skin finally ruptured each night, breaking under his unending barrage, that he finally relented. Fear of his own tainted blood marring what was left of his pure heavenly essence stopping the flow of his ire.

He'd spend the rest of the time hissing, washing away the blood before it could land on fragile, fleeting white, hoping against hope that his own blood wouldn't tarnish them any further than they already were.

* * *

"...Shit."

Aziraphale winced as he stared, almost callously, down at blood stained hands. There had been an odd nub in his wings when he'd gone to groom them that morning. A strange lump that kept catching on his fingers as he tried to run them through sparse feathers. It had irritated him, the heated pain of touching it fuelling his motions to get rid of it all the more. It wasn't meant to be there- whatever it was- so no matter how much it hurt, he was going to get rid of it.

He'd carried on tugging at it, twisting it this way and that without even looking, without paying attention to the rest of his wings as his frustration at the world focused solely on this one scant prickle, as if soothing this particular thorn in his side would make the day seem at least numb again instead of frantic and .overwhelming

It had finally come loose, snapping with a strange sucking squelch, a warm, wet pain flowing out of the spot it had lain as he sighed with relief.

It was only when he drew the offending object into his line of sight that he saw the folly in his endeavour.

It was a new feather, one that had been slowly forming in the patch of grazed skin where the first plucked feather had been. It was bright crimson throughout its core, hardly even barbed with how quickly he had pulled it.

The sight troubled him for a moment, but not for the reasons it should. He'd stopped looking in the mirror a while ago, using only his fingers to guide him to unruly specimens that needed disciplining. It made him wonder how many others were the wrong colour, how many others marred his gleaming white wings with hideous flecks of polluted red.

The worrisome thought evaporated quickly though. The crimson had begun to leak into his palm, sticky and cold as it cooled in the still air. There was something... urgent about it, something that said he shouldn't just be morosely observing the broken shaft and should instead be doing _something_ about it.

The viscous material seeped through his fingertips and, just as it dripped to the ground and his eyes followed its descent with detachment, he noted the droplets of red that had already splattered across the wooden flooring.

And just like that, it clicked, like a fire alarm ringing in his skull, that he was bleeding.

He was still bleeding.

" _Shit_."

The liquid was still pumping out of him, warm and insistent, cooling as it trickled down and slid in rivulets through his feathers. It stuck them together in an awful mess, drying them in clumps even as more blood fell from the wound. There was a chunk of feather shaft still caught there, as he found his way to the crux of the matter, pumping out blood like a leaky faucet that he could only internally freak out at.

He didn't know what to do.

All of his efforts to keep himself clean, _pure_ , were all futile. His own poisonous blood leaked over what was left of his damaged wings and peppered the floor with his failure.

"No. No, no, no, _no_." He could feel it staining him, feel his transgressions clinging to him instead of being yanked out like they usually were when he plucked feathers. All his sins, wrapping their spindly fingers around what was left of him, thick vines choking the core of a tree until all that remained was decaying wood and a fruitful vine.

The feather shaft rattled again the kitchen sink as he all but threw it in, darting over to it as if he were about to be sick. His hands clenched at the side of the metal before the nausea subsided long enough for him to twist the hot water tap to full and press both hands beneath it, shakily clawing at the congealing substance on his skin as if mere persistence would make it disappear. He hated the pink streams that ran between his fingers, hated the dried red clumps that refused to budge from beneath small fingernails. He found himself choking on pained gasps, little soft whimpers as the stains became less but never really seemed to go away.

The notion that his hands were going red from his ministrations and the heat of the water never even entered his head.

"Aziraphale?"

Even though his hands were burning, his insides went cold as ice.

_No._

_No, not now. Any when but now._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I made myself lightheaded with the pin feather. I don't even know. I'm still unsure whether I just held my breath or not while writing.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And finally! The comfort <3

"Aziraphale?"

_Not now. Any when but now._

Without even thinking about the wound that he still had to deal with, Aziraphale found himself pushing his wings back into the ether. He ignored the almost screeching pain this caused, crushing, shoving them this way and that, to fit away nicely seemed to do. It did nothing for the feeling of warmth spreading across them, speckling and smearing between them with the strange awkward movements he was making them do to accommodate the inconvenience of it all.

But it didn't matter. What mattered was Crowley couldn't _see_.

He went back to scrubbing his hands, pushing them deeper into the scalding water as he tried to think on what to say and bypass the stuttering panic his friend had caused.

"Aziraphale?" The voice was closer this time. Too close.

"J-just a minute!" The words croaked out him, lacking all the reassurance he had hoped to contain in them.

"Angel?-" God, that nickname felt like another wound opening in his chest. "Are you OK?"

_Oh god, he was terrible at this._ "Of- Of course I am, dear. Nothing to worry about." He swallowed down bile, hoping to quell the tremor on his tongue. "I'll be out in a second." Once he could get this blasted blood off of his hands.

"You don't sound alright."

Aziraphale stiffened. Crowley's voice emanated from the doorway to the room, no longer hindered by walls or doors. He swallowed, turning his head to find his friend standing there, concern practically dripping from his languid body as he leaned against the door frame. He didn't deserve all of that worry. "N-No?"

"No." Crowley's mouth slipped further downwards, his sunglasses hiding his eyes in a way that made Aziraphale feel even worse. He couldn't tell what he was thinking- was it actually concern? Or disgust? Did he _know_? No, he couldn't know- "There's blood on the floor."

"O-Oh." Aziraphale swallowed, looking back at his hands, still scrubbing and scratching, red, raw and numb, even as they spoke. "Blood? That's- it's not mine. Nothing to worry about."

He could have hit himself.

Not his? How dumb was he to use that as an excuse?

"Uh-huh." He heard Crowley's solid footsteps getting closer, each one another gunshot to his already shot nerves. If he got too close, then he'd realise something was off, and then- then-

Aziraphale didn't want to think about what happened then.

"You been fighting, Angel?" There was a pained humour to the other's voice, like he was trying for comedy but couldn't bring himself to really feel it when the atmosphere was so tense. "I'd hate to see the other guy if you have." Silence reigned between them, awkward and heavy and it fell like another layer of sin on Aziraphale's back. "Shall we try that again?" The words were softer this time. Gentle and calming, placating even. "What happened?"

"It was just an accident." His mouth was dry as sandpaper, his hands still straining under the water as he refused to turn and look at the other again. He wasn't sure what he would do or say if he did. "Nothing to worry about." He was a broken record, an antiquated mantra of _please stop asking, please stop looking, just let me be_ -

Crowley had never been one to do what he was told though. Always asking the questions no one else wanted to ask.

"Shit, _Aziraphale._ " The words were louder this time, closer than he expected and he couldn't help the pulse, the flinch of fear as arms encircled his and quickly turned off the hot tap. Of course, from where he'd been standing he probably couldn't have known, and before Aziraphale knew it there was cold water running over him instead, and careful, pliant fingers running soft trails over his scalded flesh. He could feel him healing him with every soft run of movements, slowly stitching him back together piece by piece instead of in one hit to make sure he didn't miss anything.

"What were you thinking, Angel?"

Nothing.

The simple answer lodged at the back of his throat and stuck to his tongue. This all felt too good, too gentle, the heat had been something to latch on to, a pain that kept everything raw and jagged but alive all the same.

He didn't deserve this.

He tried to tug away but the other held him with surprising strength. He found himself glancing up, to snap something vicious in the hopes he would leave him to it but the words shrivelled up and died as golden eyes locked with his, pupils blown wide with fear and heartbreaking distress.

He'd caused that.

This was why he hadn't wanted him to see.

"Shh. Stop, Angel, it's OK."

Aziraphale hadn't even realised he'd been making noise, clamping his mouth shut on the stuttered nonsensical words as Crowley looked back down at his hands, gently pulling them back under the cold spray of water. There were gentle thumbs rubbing rings into the back of his palms, and even gentler words slipping through the stilted, hushed air around them. His breathing kept hitching, soft choked noises of distress and every time Crowley gave back a soft rumble of his own, sympathetic and concerned in equal measures.

"Ready to talk?"

"No." The word came out a lot stronger and clearer than either of them had expected, startling them out of the surreal bubble that had surrounded them.

Crowley's adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed, and Aziraphale hated how despondent the minuscule action seemed. "OK. That's OK. Whenever you're ready."

Never.

He'd bottle it all up again and hide away and sooner or later something would break.

It had to, this couldn't be all there was forever.

His attention zoned back into the room as Crowley gave an almost imperceptible hiss. It was just a soft exhale, a stuttered little thing but filled with so much emotion that Aziraphale couldn't help but notice. His eyes strayed back to Crowley's face, watching the yellow of his eyes grow ever brighter and leech out further. It was something he'd noticed a few times, how Crowley's eyes betrayed him no matter how hard he tried to pretend otherwise. And not in a demonic way, not in the visibly different way that he hid them for, but in the way they broadcast his emotions for the world if only they knew to stare deeply into them.

...Actually, the more he thought about it, the more he wondered if _that_ was the real reason he hid behind dark glasses and sardonic tones.

But right now, with him, he showed all that vulnerability without a question, without a hint of shame or remorse. He wondered when he had been permitted to see this side of him, when the trust between them had grown to this level that Crowley would wear his heart on his sleeve and damn anyone who called him out on it. Perhaps, it was because it was just them against the world now. It didn't matter what the denizens of hell thought anymore-

Oh. Right. Crowley had lost his family for the second time. First, the Fall and now the apocalypse. What was he doing wallowing in self-pity when he should be helping his old friend instead? His pain couldn't even be comparable, not when he had yet to fall.

"Thanks, dear boy." The words felt like leaden weights on his tongue, characterisations of himself that didn't hit the mark. "I don't know what came over me, but I think you've uhh- you can let go now."

Crowley didn't seem to hear him. Or if he did, he pointedly ignored him, his hands tightening around Aziraphale's own, checking them over in detail as if he didn't believe his words for a second. Then again, why should he? Aziraphale had been blistering his skin to nothing, not minutes before, why would his opinion on how healed they were alleviate his concerns? So, instead, he watched his gaze, waiting for the moment when he deemed his ministrations complete. But for some reason, he couldn't get a read entirely on them as they flicked back and forth, processing, his mouth a thin tight line as if there was so much that wanted to spew forth and he was trying his best to control himself.

Aziraphale followed his gaze when he realised a response was not forthcoming. He traced the lines that he was navigating with his eyes. Took in the pink flecks of water that coated the inside of the sink- his stomach rebelled against him, he'd have to scrub that next, scrub and scrub until it shined brighter than it had ever shined before. Winced at the bright red hand prints that clenched tightly to the edge, holding on for dear life and smearing across the faucet in a line of desperation.

Of course the man was worried, wouldn't he himself be if he saw this sight?

That wasn't the worst of it, however.

It took a few more seconds, drawn out and slow as if his world was standing on the edge of a precipice and he hadn't quite realised he'd already fallen off long ago. As if the whistling winds had just managed to catch up with him and remind him that he had jumped, that he had taken the step and now all he could do was watch as the ground came closer and closer to greet him.

His hands trembled against warm soothing skin, catching him as he fell.

He realised what Crowley had hissed at now.

His eyes followed the pink rivulets of bloody water, getting redder and redder until they caught on the offending article from before.

The awful, hideous excuse of a feather. 

It glared defiantly back at him, its jagged edge sharp and pointed as if it was ready and waiting to cut him to the quick and bleed him dry of everything that made him him, its bedraggled barbs proving that he was no more an angel than the man stood beside him.

_You did this to me._ It whispered insidiously. _You tore me out and you only have yourself to blame._

"Angel, breathe."

Oh.

He took a shuddering gasp, eyes flicking back to Crowley though the other hadn't even looked around.

He always knew exactly what he needed. Maybe not always what he wanted, but what he needed nonetheless.

...He was beginning to feel lightheaded. Was it due to the outpouring of concern beside him? Or the fact that he kept forgetting to breathe as everything he wished to hide got closer to the surface?

"Is that-" Crowley's voice hit a pitch that he wasn't sure he'd heard before, or at least not in a very long time. It was high, stilted and it hitched with a choke that he wished to soothe in turn, wished to right whatever wrong had caused that much distress and hating all the while that it was him. He had done that. "Is that a pin feather?"

Oh no.

His wing ached against his back, burning with the loss as if recalled to existence by Crowley's words.

_He knew._

_He knows. He knows what you've done. He knows what's happening to you._

_He'll leave soon. He'll leave you to fall, just like he had to, just like they all had to._

_Why would anyone stay around to comfort you through that? Falling alone shows what you have become. It is a punishment, a grief you must bear alone._

"Angel, what have you been doing to yourself?"

The hands migrated to his wrists, pulling them back out of the water and turning him around, so that the pair now faced one another. The water still gushed from the sink, forgotten and unimportant in the whole scheme of things. He wasn't even sure the question had been for him, it sounded more rhetoric, more an utterance of pure disheartened dismay and it made his eyes sting with every unshed emotion.

Crowley didn't deserve this.

He shouldn't have to put up with all of this, he shouldn't even know about it.

"Aziraphale? Speak to me." A gentle hand cupped his cheek, the other still holding both his own as if to stop him from pulling away. And he did- he did want to pull away but he also wanted to hide in his embrace, hide from all the sorrow and fear, and just _break_.

But that wasn't fair. Not to him.

The hand tugged at his chin, pulling his face up until their eyes met and he watched as Crowley searched his face for something- anything, that would tell him how to continue, tell him how to help.

But he couldn't- he shouldn't.

"What's going on?"

No, it would be best if he could just fake it all until Crowley left and then- then he could get back to wallowing.

"N-nothing." The word finally slipped out of him, like a poison that dripped sweet and sickly down his lips. "It was an accident, you know me, so- so clumsy and all. I'd forget my head if it wasn't screwed on." He swallowed, the lump in his throat growing in size as if to suffocate him with his own lies. Crowley's eyes bore into him all the while. "Humans are so fragile, aren't they? Completely forgot that they can't take heat like that."

"Yeah?" The word was skeptical at best, and yet there was a soft humour mixed into it that he couldn't help but relax into.

"Yep." He popped the 'p' with a sheepish chuckle, tugging his arms out of Crowley's grip. He lamented the move almost immediately, the cold burrowing into the spaces where his fingers had rested. The hand dropped from his cheek, in return, leaving a cold burn that he held on to, keeping him in the moment, wishing it was there once more as much as he was relieved by its removal. "Thank you for your assistance."

"...Right." Crowley raised an eyebrow at him, fiddling with his sunglasses as if debating putting them back on. Aziraphale's heart sunk, there was something in the movement that left him feeling doubtful and on edge. "You still didn't answer my question, you know."

"O-Oh?"

"Yeah. Is that a pin feather?" Crowley stared down at his own hands as an awkward silence filled the air between them. His words were nonchalant, filled with a distant calm as if they were merely discussing the weather. He placed his glasses down on the kitchen side, Aziraphale softly exhaling in relief until his hand instead reached for the bloody, mangled remains in the sink. Red stained his fingers, and Aziraphale resisted the insistent urge to slap it out of his hands and rinse off the vile blood from him before it could corrupt him too. Instead, he watched as the other delicately span the chunk of feather, with no hint of concern to the situation or what it could do to him. "You realise that they don't stop bleeding, right?" Crowley's eyes flicked back to him for a moment, once again betraying the racing fear that his mouth was resolutely denying. "If you don't leave them to grow like they should or get them out entirely they just bleed and bleed."

Oh.

Perhaps, _that_ was why he felt lightheaded.

His wings beat again with a swell of pain, warm and heavy and wet. He hadn't noticed the wet before, seeping through in bubbling patches, probably coating the ether as much as himself. The urge to cry was near suffocating, his throat hitching with the dismay of it all. Everything was ruined now, everything was worthless and soaked and he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to clean the stain of it away. He felt lopsided, heavy, like one wing was now a dead weight, fallen and useless at his side. 

He'd gone and done it now, hadn't he? He'd started the process and there was nothing he could do. Caught in the middle, one wing lost and the other still trying desperately to keep him skyward.

And Crowley still kept flicking his gaze to him, a lightning strike every time, waiting for him to make the next move.

"I-I see." Damn it. Why did he say anything at all? It felt like he'd confirmed something he shouldn't have as Crowley nodded, placing the feather shaft on the side, causing another stain that Aziraphale desperately wanted to burn from existence. Why didn't he realise how much it meant? Why didn't he put it back instead of creating more mess? But for whatever reason, the other seemed unaffected by the disapproving noise, turning back to face him fully.

"We should deal with that then, shouldn't we?"

Time sped back up.

It gave him whiplash, pulling him back into the world with a violent thud. What could he do? What could he say? His mind was blank with the sudden change in pressure, and yet every second he waited was another push forward from the other, another moment lost to contain the situation before it got out of hand.

And it would get out of hand- Crowley couldn't- he wouldn't let him see- his wings were a mess, a state- there was nothing left to them that would give the other pause. He would take one look and he wouldn't be able to keep the disgust from his features, he'd laugh at the pathetic waste he was. He couldn't even fall properly, couldn't even be a demon without ripping out his feathers in fear of what was to come. He'd snarl at him. Did he hate the thought of being like him that much? Did he despise him that much?

No. No, he couldn't see. His world would crumble and he'd be left all alone again.

He needed to be alone, but only for a little while. Once he'd come to terms with it all, Crowley would be there for him, he'd understand.

He just needed to deal with this part by himself.

"N-No!" His voice cracked, loud and abrasive against the hushed air, both of them flinching at the boom of it. "No, that's- that's quite all right. You shouldn't have to deal with that. I can do it perfectly well on my own, thank you very much."

"I mean, the fact that you haven't yet would beg to differ."

"Just because I didn't realise, doesn't mean I'm incapable." Aziraphale's gaze hardened, his anger fuelled by utter fear and vulnerability. "I can look after myself adequately, I'll have you know."

Crowley raised an eyebrow. "Never said you couldn't. Doesn't mean you can't have help every once in a while." His other eyebrow joined the first, a knowing hint to his eyes that Aziraphale loathed. "And you weren't complaining a few moments ago when it came to your hands."

"Y-yes, well. That's different."

"Is it?"

"Yes." Aziraphale nodded as Crowley's mouth twisted down at one side, a thoughtful grimace as his eyebrows furrowed over an irritated gaze. "It's more- personal? Yes, that's it. Personal. I can deal with it myself." He swallowed as the other continued to silently stare, glancing away from the plaintive gaze. "But- thank you, for the concern, that is."

The silence stretched between them.

He hazarded a quick look over at the other and caught a strange glint of determined apology in his expression.

"How long have you been plucking, Angel?"

Oh, drat.

"Plucking? Deliberate- how could you think that, that's-" True, so very true, but how could he have cottoned on that quickly. Surely it wasn't that obvious. Indignation rattled through him, fake and nauseating but quick tempered in the heat of his sick shame. "Ridiculous! Abhorrent! Why would I- the nerve of you." He swallowed, plucking up the courage before taking quick strides past the other, ignoring how his face fell along with his heart. "I told you it was an accident. Now if you don't mind, I'd rather you left so I could deal with the- bleeding, as you called it."

"Angel-"

"Stop. You've done enough." _Please. Please just go._

"Where are they?"

Aziraphale paused in the doorway, his heart hammering against his rib cage. He turned his head slowly to look back over his shoulder, hesitant and fearful that this would be the moment he broke- but the other hadn't moved. He was still standing where he had left him, facing the other way, his question light and soft, in contrast to his tightly clenched fists. "Where's-?"

"The feathers." Crowley turned then, freezing Aziraphale where he stood. He felt like prey, caught in the snake's sharp slitted gaze. His pupils had thinned to sharp points, taking everything in and leaving him feeling more seen that he would have thought possible. "Come now, Angel. I know you. You wouldn't get rid of them. Miracling them away would make you feel worse, so- what did you do with them?" He tilted his head, mulling over the question in his head as if he'd never actually meant for Aziraphale to answer him.

"I- whatever you are implying I can assure you, you're mistaken-"

"No... No." Crowley hummed, tapping his foot, cutting off his words as resolutely as if he'd struck him. "See, I can't imagine you getting rid of them. Not if you're plucking deliberately-"

"But I'm not-"

"And, there's no sign of them down here, well, other than the obvious." His eyes flicked back to the worktop as if the other hadn't spoken before locking back on to him. "So, where..."

Aziraphale sighed, shaking his head as he turned to leave again. "This is utterly ridiculous, Crowley. You should leave."

"So, they are here then." His voice carried, louder, musing, as if he had confirmed everything with his denial.

He hated it. Hated how the other could see through him like this.

"What?"

"Hmm... I'm going to say upstairs, you hardly ever go up there so why not?"

A bucket of ice water fell on to Aziraphale's head, slipping down his spine to leave him shaking with the sudden cold. "P-preposterous."

"Then you won't mind me taking a look."

He was far too serpentine for his own good.

Aziraphale blinked as he felt warmth beside him for barely a moment and then it was gone again, worming around him in that quick and yet unhurried pace than only Crowley seemed able to commit too. He slunk past, without even a second glance, and Aziraphale felt his lungs lock up at the path he had taken.

It was like watching a car crash, an inescapable catastrophe. His words caught in his throat, panic fluttering through him like so many of the rotten feathers he had discarded upstairs, all of them rattling and howling throughout his being, begging to be shown, begging to be released- and it felt like there was nothing he could do to sway the course of time.

The squeak of the first step was what it took to break the moment.

He slammed into the other room, ricocheting off the door frame in his haste. "Wait!"

The demon paused at the bottom of his stairs, poised to continue but waiting as he requested. It would have been ironic, a demon doing as he was told, in any other situation but this. "So?"

Aziraphale coughed. "S-So, what?"

Crowley sighed, his shoulders slumping. "I just want to help, Angel."

"I-I know that, Crowley, but you-"

"So they are up there then?"

No matter what he did, he couldn't get a handle on the conversation. Crowley saw right through him, every single time. "I- That is- Crowley, please don't go up there."

"OK."

Crowley took his foot off the bottom step, still staring into the dark abyss that was his staircase. Aziraphale could hear the whispers of his sins, like ghosts above them, but he ignored them, hidden in the relief that was the other staying with him.

"We really should see to your wing, Aziraphale."

He didn't know what to say to that.

"I can't help you if you don't let me." Crowley finally turned to him again, eyes sparkling wetly, making his stomach lurch with a new wave of remorse and guilt. "I know it's hard to let people help but- sometimes, you can't get through it all on your own."

Aziraphale swallowed, his mouth like sandpaper. "I don't know how."

He hadn't even meant to say that and yet it felt right. How could anyone help with this? Why should they? It was all part of the plan... wasn't it?

"That's OK. Let me try and we'll see how it goes, OK? Please, just let me try." Crowley's eyes beseeched him, his fingers once more finding Aziraphale's hands and the latter found that it was Crowley this time who shook beneath his grasp. "I thought I'd lost you once before. I'd rather not watch that happen again, only slower this time and without being able to help."

Oh, how could this man ever be a demon?

Or was this how it worked? Another temptation? Another insidious little wisp that drove him deeper on his path. _Let me in, let me in, please, let me in._

...It didn't feel like a temptation.

In fact it felt like another punishment. Another sin against him. How could he hurt Crowley so? If he'd only been more careful, if he'd only thought more, then perhaps his friend wouldn't have had to watch the world burn on his own for a while.

_I've lost my best friend._

God, those words stung. The care, the grief. He'd done that, all that time ago. He'd never have thought the other could care so deeply but it was clear as day when he looked at him, bright as shimmering gold and as painful as sharp glass.

Perhaps another punishment was in order.

Aziraphale found himself unable to disagree with those eyes. Those eyes that saw through him so easily and captivated him even easier.

He found himself unable to look any longer into those pools of molten gold, couldn't bear to see his expression morph into horror, into that loathsome repugnant expression he himself wore whenever he stared in the mirror.

He closed his eyes, felt the hands in his grip tighter in solidarity, proud and thankful as he coaxed him to continue. He took a steadying breath and let his wings unfurl. It was more painful than he expected, like dragging them back into existence pulled at every aching expanse of skin and barely held together feathers, each one a vibration of pain against the edges of the ether. He heard liquid splatter against the ground in a sickening thud once they were fully exposed, one hanging limper than the other. The scent of blood spread like miasma between them, like the battlefields of old or a hospital where he hoped to help with their pain the best he could and wept over what humans could do to one another.

What they could do to themselves.

It wouldn't be long now. He'd pull away from the carnage soon enough. He'd run from it all, run from the burden that was him.

"Oh, _Angel_."

The words were so plaintive, so filled with love and sorrow that his knees buckled at the sound of them. He'd expected disgust, revulsion, at best pity. But this wasn't pity, this was raw desolate heartbreak. It seeped into his soul, tightened constrictingly around his chest and made it hard to breathe. He'd expected him to yell, to scream, to tell him he was everything he thought he was. But this _whisper_. This soft hum of horror that wormed its way into his ears and tore him down piece by piece as if the walls he had built around himself were nothing but cardboard and paper.

"What have you done to yourself, my love?"

The words continued to break down the barriers he'd forced up, the simple soft term of endearment shaking him to his core. It was less of a question and more of an answer, dredging up every injury he had done to himself, every broken moment that he had tried to pretend had never happened whenever anyone came near.

He had done this.

Not Her. Not Them.

Him.

Had he ever truly needed anyone else to destroy himself so utterly and completely?

There were soft hands on his elbows now. He hadn't even realised they had moved, his legs giving out on him entirely it seemed, as he slumped forward into the other who was continuing soft lilting mantras as if he could fix the world with just his words. Perhaps he could. Aziraphale wouldn't have been surprised. So self-assured, so ready to take on everyone and everything- did he ever doubt himself? Doubt that he could achieve everything he put his mind to?

_My love._

Why did those words sting?

Perhaps because he didn't deserve them.

"Hey now, it's OK. I've got you. Let me help you."

He felt himself get manoeuvred into a seated position, as comfortable as possible, considering the circumstances. The hands at his elbows vanished, leaving warm imprints where they had been, before bright hot fingers found his face, soothing and soft against his cheeks. He flinched at the contact ever so slightly, more unexpected than anything, confused by the wet trails that the man wiped away with light hands and even lighter murmurs, coaxing him out of the dark pit he had found himself in. He opened bleary eyes, blinking rapidly to try and form a coherent image as the flow of water pooled and receded with every blink.

"That's it. Look at me, Angel. I'm right here." There was a watery sheen to the others face, desperate bright eyes gleaming like molten gold, fiery red hair burning like the sun against the darkness he had let himself sink into.

He'd been drowning for so long, the air felt like it burned, the heat felt ice cold and prickled at his skin.

How long had he been depriving himself of the sun as penance for his sins?

How long had he lingered in the shadows waiting for the final step to plunge him headfirst into Hell?

"Shh, shh, it's OK. I promise you it's OK." He felt himself get engulfed, heard his own hitching sobs through a fog of static that was muffled further by cloth, as warm arms encircled him and began to rock him gently. When had he become so gentle? When had the abrasive edge worn down to this soft, warm being? "I'll get you through this, don't you worry. Just please let me help you."

It was like every word from the others lips made a journey through his ears and down his face, healing and breaking him anew with every stuttered gasp.

"I-I didn't mean to-"

"Shh, I know. I know."

"But-"

"It's OK."

Aziraphale felt more than heard the long sigh as he shook his head and buried it further into Crowley's chest. It wasn't OK, not really. Nothing was. How could it be?

"Alright, maybe it's not OK. " Crowley shrugged, bumping him ever so slightly in the process. "But it will be."

"How-" There was a lump of tar in his throat, solid and stifling. He swallowed, grateful when the other continued to rock him silently, waiting patiently. "How do you know?"

"Easy." Crowley pulled back enough to catch his eye, smile wobbly but there, if ever so painful and concerned. "When have we ever not done what we put our minds to?"

Aziraphale blinked at him, tears momentarily ceasing in his confusion. "Since Eden? I feel like there's many times I could think of."

"Fair. So maybe it took time, and more trial and error than I will ever admit- but we still got there in the end, didn't we?" Crowley's smile grew as Aziraphale frowned. "And sure, this isn't going to be as easy as miracling away a few feathers-" He tried to ignore the wince his words caused. "-but that doesn't mean you won't be back to your old self again soon."

Aziraphale's expression dropped further, hiding his face again before speaking. "I don't know about that."

"Of course not. Cause you're in there." Aziraphale squeaked as his forehead was flicked before the arm continued its journey and he found himself freezing as fingers threaded between feathers at the base of his wings. "Now then, I think we should get to the most pressing matter at hand, if that's alright?"

"I don't-"

"Come on, Angel. You can't do this alone."

He found himself unable to respond. There was so much in that short sentence. Not even a please and yet the plea was there, strong and anchoring, a prayer that the other uttered only for him, and only to him. He could only nod, sinking forward into the embrace and pushing his wings within reach. He felt the other relax beneath him, one hand continuing to create soft movements in the down at his back, reassuring, warm motions, tangling and untangling with a rhythmic pattern that drew his attention away from everything else. It wasn't until there was a sharp knot of pain that his mind snapped back to what was happening, as a hand found the offending tattered remnant of the feather he'd snapped earlier.

"Sorry." The ministrations of his other hand grew stronger, trying to counteract the pain and even as Aziraphale gritted his teeth he knew Crowley was trying his best to work as quickly and as painlessly as possible. The feather came out with a sharp tug, a squelch of liquid pain that he whimpered through without thought but the hollow numb pain afterwards was still a relief from the pinprick of before.

"There we go." A soft cloth was pressed against the wound, though he wasn't sure where it had come from. "That should do it. It can start healing now." There was a pressure on top of his head, heated lips against his curls that rumbled out sweet words straight into his skull. "You can start to heal."

Could it really be that simple?

Crowley laughed, a soft, strange noise but one that Aziraphale didn't find himself minding, even if he found it out of place. "Maybe not. But a start is better than nothing."

Oh.

He hadn't meant to say anything out loud.

There were hands at his elbows again, this time pulling him upwards, more an invitation, a hope, than anything forceful. "How about we continue the process?"

Aziraphale didn't really understand, his head was so full of cotton wool, questions that lay unanswered, events that he had foreseen that had never taken place, taking up the necessary space to function. All the reassurance was getting to him, it was a balm on his broken parts, though it stung, medicinal and cleansing in it's burning sensation. It left him hollow, exhausted beyond belief and yet he felt better than he had since the ordeal had begun.

The voices had been swallowed up, suffocated; strangled by the vines and flowers that were Crowley's words trailing into the spaces of his soul, pulling him back together and holding him there until he could stand on his own two feet once more without crumbling to dust.

He was alone, finally alone within his own head.

And yet the hand on his arm reminded him that he wasn't truly alone, no matter what Heaven decided for him.

How ironic, that a demons presence could soothe the aching hole that angels had left in him.

He jolted back to reality as he felt the back of his knees hit something solid and he fell into a seated position on his own comfortable couch. Before he could ask what was happening Crowley had vanished from his peripherals, propping his wings up over the back for easy access and to keep them in a relaxed position so that Aziraphale wouldn't have to stiffly hold up the worn out appendages.

However, that wasn't quite where Aziraphale's mind went, his heart plummeting into his stomach to twist nauseatingly in his own festering thoughts.

"Oh Go- dear, there's going to be blood everywhere. I should-"

"Stop."

Aziraphale swallowed drily as Crowley gave the command. There was no heat to the words, only that constant pressure of knowing support. He wasn't sure how the other knew what to do or how to do it and yet each utterance gave him pause instead of inciting him to anger or defence.

He wasn't sure why everything was tying him into knots but if Crowley knew the answer, then who was he to stop him?

"Just let me take care of it all." Crowley's head appeared upside down from above him. "All you need to do is rest."

Aziraphale gave out a choking laugh. "You make it sound like I'm ill."

Crowley pulled back, but his words still sent his thoughts racing once more. "You are ill, Angel. That's all this is. And once we find out what's going on, I assure you, you'll get better again."

Aziraphale slumped, though he straightened up once the other hissed in discontent and propped him back up to a better position for him to work. He felt deft hands begin to tweak at his blood soaked wings, repulsion and disgust beating through him in equal measures. "I already know what's caused this." Before Crowley could get a word in edge ways he derailed the conversation. "You're going to get blood all over you if you do that."

He could almost hear the eye roll he received, the soft sarcastic snort as Crowley ignored him and continued on. "I'm prepared for that, Angel." Aziraphale twitched, eyebrows furrowing as the parts that the other touched felt cleaner already, without anything being added. He wasn't sure why another's miracles felt more real than his own, but this- this didn't strike him as a lie like his own did. "Now, will you let me continue without any more interruptions?"

Aziraphale huffed, sniffing petulantly, not even realising the air of normality emanating between them. "Fine."

" _Thank you_." The words dripped with fake gratitude, sarcasm rolling off of his tongue to land in amongst Aziraphale's curls and he couldn't help but chuckle at the barbed tone. The silence became more bearable, more peaceful as he felt his rough edges get sanded down, soothed as each sparse feather was put back into its perfect place in a way he knew he'd never have been able to achieve. "So... what caused all this then? If you already know, that is." The words were hesitant, on tenterhooks as if with a gust of wind all of his efforts would be torn out of his hands and he'd only have himself to blame.

Aziraphale couldn't help the shame that bubbled up his throat at the careful manner he was being treated. He felt fragile. Raw and broken, and he wasn't sure he deserved for anyone else to pick up the pieces, let alone this delicately.

"I thought you didn't want any more interruptions?"

The words fell out of him with little struggle, a strange hysterical bubble of routine, a strange semblance of rationality that didn't quite reach his heart as it normally would.

Crowley however, laughed at the utterance, dropping his head down to knock it against the back of his. "There he is."

"I'm sorry?"

"There's the bastard I know."

The rumble of laughter continued, rattling through the back of him and he found that he couldn't help but reciprocate it. It wasn't quite right, more a release of energy, a burst of emotion that needed an outlet other than tears. It echoed and was shared between them, stifling everything else if only for a moment in a heady haze of relief masquerading as humour.

Perhaps things would be alright.

In the end at least.

"I can work and talk, you know that."

"Can you? I've seen you fall over air before."

"But I did continue talking, didn't I?"

Aziraphale's laugh grew lighter. "It's hard to get you to stop."

"Exactly. So, you know exactly what I meant by interruptions to my work. Now. Talk." Crowley's hands faltered, his words becoming less assured and worried. "That is- if you want to talk to me."

Aziraphale let his shoulders slump. He deserved this, didn't he? If he was doing all this work when he really should leave him to it, then he at least deserved an answer, right?

And if he was honest, it would be nice to have someone else's opinion, even if all it did was confirm his own suspicions.

"I don't know who I am anymore."

"That's easy. You're Aziraphale."

A bubble of unexpected laughter escaped him. "You know that's not what I mean."

"Then what do you mean?"

Aziraphale gave an irritated sigh. Why was this so difficult to formulate? "What kind of Angel am I? What kind of Angel doesn't have a link to Heaven?"

"Probably a very good one, if you ask me."

" _Crowley._ "

"What? It's true. They're all up their own arses-" Another choked off squeal of _Crowley_ gave him pause. "Alright, alright- but I stand by what I said." Aziraphale felt a rather itchy knot of feathers loosen and relax beneath clever fingers. "You're a better person than all of them combined. So I'd say you're a better angel than any one of them too." He sighed when Aziraphale didn't answer, fingers twiddling into another stuck together clump of down. "You care, Angel. A lot more than any of them have in a very long time. If She can't see that then She's blind."

"Crowley." He wasn't sure if he was reprimanding him or in awe of his spirit.

"I mean it. The world would have gone to shit with them in charge. Maybe She meant for us to do what we did- maybe She didn't. Doesn't mean we didn't do the right thing by the humans. And I'd like to think that matters."

Aziraphale sank back into the chair, his head falling back to watch Crowley work. "I'd like to think that too." The words were barely a whisper, more a breath of air with words dashed in between. A prayer, a promise, something unspoken that could shatter if given freely to the world around them.

"Then that's all there is to it."

He made it all sound so easy. Aziraphale closed his eyes, his body limp and tired from the array of emotions. It all sounded so simple, too good to be true, and perhaps that's why it was so hard to believe.

"But I understand, you know."

Aziraphale opened his eyes slowly, catching hold of golden orbs above him, face guilty though he wasn't quite sure why. "Hmm?"

"It must be hard to be... disconnected. Cut adrift." Aziraphale's stomach clenched in sympathy as Crowley glanced away, broke the moment. "No matter how much you hated them watching your every move, and how they treated you, they were still family, right? It still... hurts to be abandoned like that." He sighed, hands patting softly down the entire length of Aziraphale's wings. "No wonder you resorted to- this. The emotional strain must have-"

"Oh. Oh, Crowley, I am sorry."

Crowley's head snapped up, eyes perplexed and sharply determined. "Hey, you don't have anything to apologise to me ab-" The determination dimmed into furrowed bemusement. "Wait, what are you apologising for?"

"You- this- everything." Aziraphale sat up, though he still kept his head tilted towards the other, keeping hold of his expression. It wouldn't do now to stop watching, he needed to know what the other truly felt and thought about all of this. He may insist on helping but if it wounded him too much then he wouldn't hear of it a second more. "I keep getting so caught up in it all that I forget you've been through this- worse than this. They were your family too, once upon a time, and I keep trying so hard not to remind you of- well- and now your other family has abandoned you too and all I can do is wallow in this God awful self-"

"Hey, hey, stop." Crowley's hands were on his face again, holding him where they could both stare at one another, though mildly disorienting by their angle. The angel found nothing but resolution in the demons gaze, fond exasperated resolve with none of the bitter tang that he had envisioned there. "That was all so long ago, that wound has had so much time to heal. But yours is raw and new, its still bleeding."

Aziraphale felt tears prickling at his eyes once more. "Am I falling?"

Crowley's face fell like his heart had been shattered. Like the mere suggestion hurt him deeply. "No, my love. The fact that you think you've done anything to warrant falling is almost too much to bear. You're so good, Angel, so good, I don't know how you can't see that."

"But-"

"But nothing."

Aziraphale shook his head, eyes bright as he stared at Crowley's daring gaze. "But if I'm not falling, then why-" He swallowed, his mouth too dry to formulate the fear that was gluing his tongue to the roof of his mouth. "Why are you doing all of this? Why aren't you just-"

Crowley frowned, his eyebrows furrowing as if it were obvious. "Just because you're hurting differently to others, doesn't mean you don't deserve help."

There was a spark then. A fizzling strange sensation that started in his heart and pumped out through his blood stream. Crowley had set off synapses that had previously become locked off, nerve patterns that he hadn't felt in a while, seeping in comforting, well-intentioned thoughts to crush the straggling remainders of the doubts that still lingered in his head. He couldn't quite put his finger on it but it all sounded so desperately, honestly human. And for all their faults and flaws, their differences and experiences made them whole and breathtakingly unique.

There really was nothing like watching humans and random acts of kindness, with or without the fear of the Almighty to bend their way.

He resented it sometimes, that ignorance, that bliss, but it also gave him hope when he watched them look after one another in no ones namesake but their own.

It took him a moment to realise Crowley was still watching him, waiting for a doubt or two still refusing to be dissuaded to bubble up out past his lips in the hope of being quashed too. "Isn't it still raw for you too?"

"Falling? Sometimes." Crowley shrugged, though the tremor in his fingers gave Aziraphale a different message. "But it hurts a lot less now." His smile turned toothy, cheeky and bright though it didn't quite reach his eyes like it might usually. "What with an Angel seemingly able to stand the sight of me. Maybe I haven't fallen as far as I thought I had."

"You're not a bad person, Crowley." Aziraphale raised his hands to press them against Crowley's, revelling in the moment they never could have had before. "But that's not what I meant. I meant being disconnected from, well- Hell."

"Oh." Crowley's face twisted thoughtfully. "They were never family, Angel. I'm sure I thought of them as family once, while- before the Fall. But afterwards... it wasn't the same. None of us were." Crowley's thumb moved in soft circles as his smile turned nostalgic and sheepish. "You were always far more family than any of them were." His smile changed, his adam's apple bobbing as he gulped down a stagnant fear that flickered behind his eyes. "Losing you scares me a lot more."

The remnants of doubts shrivelled up beneath that remark. Losing Crowley... Losing Crowley instead of losing his connection to Heaven.

...He'd make his choice again and again and again.

Aziraphale tilted his head, brushing his lips against the palm of Crowley's hand and feeling the tremor in it once more. "Losing you scares me too."

Crowley sighed, relaxing into the sensation. Aziraphale could feel his pulse beneath his lips, could feel the feather light thrum that spoke of a quickening heart beat, all the fear, all the sorrow at his actions. But he could also feel that the other knew he had begun to get through to him, he could feel that heady relief that maybe he was making a difference.

"I didn't have anyone to help me after I fell, Angel. Let me be here for you. Let me make sure you never have to go through any of this alone, no matter the outcome."

Aziraphale knew he would let him. He'd let him do anything in that moment. He had healed him more than he ever thought possible in the space of minutes, whereas alone he had stewed and suffered and broken himself time and time again. "OK."

" _Thank you._ " The words were punctuated with a kiss to his forehead, a warm breath of gratitude that lingered in his blood and sparked through his brain. "They never deserved you. You're too good for all of them."

Aziraphale let out a breathy laugh, closing his eyes as he finally let Crowley retract his hands from his grip and get back to work. It was obvious he didn't believe him, but he also knew that Crowley would repeat the words until there was a chance that might change and it filled him with a warmth that couldn't be quelled by cold thoughts alone. "How are you so good at this, my dear?"

Crowley's hands stuttered on his wings, like he'd been caught in a lie, or gotten himself tangled physically in feathers that were too sparse to cause such a reaction. "What was that?"

Aziraphale's eyes opened once more, taking in the man who now refused to meet his gaze, concentrating on his own hands and fiddling ever so focused as if their conversation had taken a turn he hadn't been prepared for. Aziraphale didn't know what had changed. "I just- you're so good at reassuring me and-" He gestured at his wings, the ache between them melting with every melded feather. "None of this has taken you by surprise."

"Oh, it did. The thought that you would-" Crowley swallowed thickly, his hands tracing patterns across outstretched wings reverently, apologetically. "If I was any good at this, I would have noticed the signs a lot sooner. I would have thought about what this could do to you."

Aziraphale frowned, trying his hardest to catch Crowley's gaze but failing miserably. He tried to sit up, to turn but Crowley tutted at him, tugging him back into position so that he could continue with only a quick mutter about _interruptions._ "I don't- that's not on you, Crowley."

"It is."

"There's no possible way you could have seen-"

"I could have. Because I've seen them before."

Their eyes locked then, Crowley's gaze more defeated than Aziraphale had ever seen it. But the words didn't quite make sense to him, there was a connection there that had yet to line up, to sink in and until then he felt like there were leagues and leagues of distance between them. "I- I don't understand."

Crowley smiled slightly, a sad smile, more of a grimace than anything mirth filled. It was a knowing expression, like everything that Aziraphale was going through made complete and utter sense to him, but he didn't see how. Not when he couldn't understand it himself. Not when every moment thinking on it felt like pushing through thick black tar and made his head pulse with bands of pain.

"You've helped someone else through-"

"No, Angel, guess again."

Aziraphale faltered, still struggling to break the surface of the mystery. Had he learnt from the humans? No, that didn't feel right. But if it wasn't another demon then-

_I didn't have anyone to help me after I fell._

Oh no.

He couldn't mean-

But the look that he was giving him, that vulnerable gaze, the one that knew he had been seen as Aziraphale stared at him with wild pained eyes was all he needed to know that it was true.

"Oh- Oh, Crowley."

"It's all in the past."

"But your- your wings are gorgeous, my dear, why on Earth would you-"

"They weren't always." Crowley shrugged, eyes finding refuge back in his work. "Or well, they didn't always seem that way. Not when they burnt black suddenly where they had been white before. They changed so drastically, so quickly and they showed everything I hated about-" He took a deep breath, closing his eyes as his hands tightened their grip unthinkingly. "I hated them. And I tore them apart." The whimper that escaped Aziraphale's lips pulled him back to him, let his fists unfurl and his eyes return the devastated hopeless look that Aziraphale's held. "I thought if I pulled apart the pieces of me that proved I was a demon then perhaps- maybe I could-"

"Perhaps it would be penance enough."

Aziraphale finished his sentence for him without intention, the void between them filled with the fear, and the longing for Heaven's forgiveness. Crowley had long ago realised it was futile, however. Now it was just for him to come to terms with.

And wasn't the thought of Crowley tearing himself apart just enough for him to realise that this was not penance, this was just blind punishment for sins that had never truly been committed.

"Well, I love your wings, just as they are." Aziraphale raised his arms slightly, gesturing for Crowley to come closer, as if he wished to run his fingers through his wings as much as he was doing through his. To soothe any lingering doubts and pains until all the regrets from the past fell away in his molts and left the beauty inside to shine on through.

Crowley leant close enough for him to reach him, smiling softly as he did so. "Well, I think your wings are lovely too, Angel. White, black or any colour in between, I'll still adore them because they're yours."

Aziraphale's nose scrunched up. "Bald and broken and bleeding? Hardly lovely."

Crowley shrugged. "Feathers grow back. My wings are proof of that."

"You think it'll be that easy?"

"Easy? Oh, it's never easy, Angel." Crowley let his hands fall on to his shoulders, creating more distracting patterns with his ever moving thumbs. "It'll take good days and bad days and everything in between. But I'll be here if you'll let me. Hopefully I can make the process easier than if you were... alone."

Aziraphale ran a soothing thumb along Crowley's cheek, his mind caught on the thought of him alone and unsure at the start of the world, never knowing exactly what was right or wrong to do. "I trust you." He realised too late that he hadn't really answered the question, but the look on Crowley's face let him know that it had hit true.

"Good. That's all I need to hear." Crowley grinned, a slightly mischievous look that Aziraphale couldn't help but get suspicious at. "So, if it's alright with you, I'd like to do this again for you. I'll make sure you don't over groom or pluck out feathers whenever your thoughts get the better of you. All you have to do is talk to me instead."

Aziraphale bit his lip, eyes dancing around his face. "What if you're- I should be able to look after myself."

"Angel."

"What if I can't help myself?"

Crowley nodded, understanding plain and clear in his eyes. "Then I'll have to give you a deterrent." His smile turned cheeky again. "I'll make you wear mittens, that way you can't do anything to them."

"Crowley-" Aziraphale huffed, rolling his eyes. "I'm not a child or- I can take mittens off you know."

"Hmm, true." Crowley hummed, face turning thoughtful as he tapped a tune with his fingers. "How about a curse then? Every time you go to touch your wings, they'll appear on your hands to remind you not to touch them."

Aziraphale blinked at him before his eyes narrowed. "You wouldn't."

"I might." Crowley raised his eyebrows, as if daring him to ask again before his face softened considerably. "But I'd rather you came to me if you were struggling. And just for a little while, I hope you can let me take care of you."

He was just so perfect.

Aziraphale didn't know what came over him in that moment. There was something bold, something new, something that had been hinted at between them for so long but now it was broken and laid bare and it was so breathtakingly there for the taking that he couldn't help but dare to choose.

And if it all fell apart in his hands, perhaps he could blame the blood loss and emotional turmoil.

He pulled Crowley down towards him, getting a startled yelp for his actions that he swallowed against his lips. Another surprised noise escaped the other but he pressed back just as passionately, eager and bright, and filled with so much love, Aziraphale thought he might burst at the seams from it.

They broke apart quickly, a lull of giddiness that felt strange against the seriousness of the situation. Crowley chuckled against his lips, short puffs of air that he wanted to swallow once more but a hand held him down ever so slightly.

"Now, what did I say about interruptions?"

Aziraphale chuckled, letting Crowley's head go with only minimal dramatics. "That they prove I'm a bastard?"

"Of course that's what you take away from that." Crowley rolled his eyes, leaning down to give him a chaste peck before pulling away once more. "I guess I do love a bastard. Now for the last time. Hold still."


End file.
